Tabulator stops for typewriters and the like



Sept. 20, 1955 A. H. SHARPE TABULATOR STOPS FOR TYPEWRITERS AND THE LIKE Filed Sept. 24, 1952 IN V EN TOR. ARTHUR H SHA RPE )5 WW ATTORNEY United States Patent Ofiice 2,718,295 Patented Sept. 20, 1955 TABULATOR STOPS FOR TYPEWRITERS AND THE LIKE Arthur H. Sharpe, West Hartford, Conn., assignor to Underwood Corporation, New York, N. Y., a corporation of Delaware Application September 24, 1952, Serial No. 311,223

1 Claim. (Cl. 197-70) The present invention relates to typewriting machines and to business machines having a carriage movable in letter-space steps under the control of a type-actuated escapement mechanism.

The invention is particularly concernedwith the tabulating mechanism of such machines and specifically with column determining carriage carried tabulator stops.

Such machines customarily have a slotted bar extending lengthwise of the carriage, there being a slot corresponding to each letter space position. In some cases, there is a stop positioned Within each slot, said stops being normally out of position to cooperate with a projected counterstop but movable as desired to columndefining counterstop-contacting position. In other cases, the slots are normally unoccupied but stops are manually inserted into whichever slots are desired, to establish one or more columns. It is with this latter type that the present invention is particularly concerned.

Business machines are expensive, and as a result, the same machine is frequently called upon to do several different types of work, each of which requires a particular arrangement of columns on a work sheet. The column stops are generally located at the rear of the carriage and access to them is sometimes difficult, thereby making the job of changing from one column setup to another a time consuming operation.

it is an object of this invention to provide an improved and simplified means whereby the column stop setup 7 of a machine of the type referred to above may be changed.

It is a further object of this invention to provide improved means whereby any desired column stop setup may be arranged in the form of an auxiliary unit and means whereby said unit may be quickly and easily attached to and detached from the machine carriage.

These and further objects, features and advantages will become more readily apparent as the description of a preferred embodiment of the invention proceeds.

Referring now to the drawing:

Figure 1 is an end view of a machine carriage and certain mechanisms which cooperate therewith, showing the auxiliary column stop unit of the invention in position on said carriage,

Figure 2 is a plan view of the auxiliary unit showing also in part the means for positioning said unit on the carriage and attaching it thereto,

Figure 3 is a side elevational view of the auxiliary unit,

Figure 4 is a side elevational view of a portion of an internally slotted tabulator bar showing the means of the present invention for attaching the auxiliary unit to said bar, and

Figure 5 is a side elevational view of a tabulator stop made in accordance with the present invention.

A typewriter or business machine carriage is indicated at 10, said carriage supporting the usual line spaceable roller platen 11 and being mounted for letter feed and return movement on a suitable front rail 12 riding on the machine framework 13 and a rear rail 14 riding on a sta- 2 tionarily mounted roller 15. During typing or printing operations the carriage moves in letter-feed direction with a step-by-step motion under control of a suitable escapement mechanism which includes a pinion 16 meshing with a rack 17 mounted on the carriage, as is well known and need not be further explained.

Forming one of the elements of the carriage is a U- shaped tabulator bar 18 which extends along the rear edge thereof and which is connected by suitable brackets to the usual end plates of the carriage, one of which end plates is partially shown in Figure 4 and designated 19. The bar 18 is mounted so that the closed portion of the U is uppermost and is provided with a series of slots 20 cut through the closed portion of the U and into the inner sides of the legs thereof. The slots 20 are adapted toreceive tabulator stops or column stops, as will presently be fully explained, and said slots are spaced one letterspace apart. There is a slot 20 for each letter-space position of the carriage.

Machines of the type with which this invention is useful are provided with a counterstop which may be projected at will into the path of the carriage-carried stops. As is well known, such machines have provision for freeing the carriage from control of the escapement when the counterstop is projected, so that the carriage runs free under the power of a spring until a carriage-carried stop strikes the projected counterstop. Machines which are to type columns of numbers generally are provided with a series of projectable counterstops so that the carriage may be tabulated to any desired decimal or letter-space position within the column. One such counterstop is partially shown in Figure 1 and designated 21.

According to the present invention, a generally rectangular bar 22, of substantially the same length as the U-shaped tabulator bar 18, is provided with a series of pairs of slots 23 in two of its opposite sides. These slots are spaced apart the distance of one letter space of the machine with which the bar is to be used, or in other words, they have the same spacing as the slots 20 of the tabulator bar. The bars 18 and 22 have the same number of slots.

For mounting on the bar 22, tabulator stops 24 are provided. These stops have a wide slot cut into their upper ends to provide two legs 25 and 26 and, as shown in Figure 5, the leg 26 is longer than the leg 25 and is provided near its upper end with a recess 27 facing the leg 25. The inner edges of the legs 25 and 26 are spaced apart just far enough so that the legs may be fitted within a pair of opposite slots 23 of the bar 22 with the inner edges of said legs lying close to or in contact with the bottoms of the slots. It will be observed from the drawing that when a stop is thus positioned on the bar 22 the recess 27 is located slightly above the top of said bar and that the end of the leg 25 lies just below the top thereof. As many stops 24 as desired may be fitted upon the bar 22, it being understood that there will be a stop 24 for each column in which the machine is to operate.

After all the desired stops 24 have been properly positioned on the bar 22, a locking slide 28 is placed on the top of said bar and one of its edges is fitted within the recesses 27 of the long legs 26 of said stops to hold them in position. It will be observed from Figure 2 that the slide is wide enough to about half cover the upper ends of the slots 23 in both sides of the bar 22. As shown in Figure 2, the locking slide is retained atop the bar 22 by a pair of shouldered screws 29 which extend through elongated slots 30 in the slide and are screwed into the top of the bar 22. These screws do not hold the slide fast to the bar 22 but permit an endwise movement thereof to the extent of the slots 30, for a reason to be presently explained. The slide 28 is provided with an upstanding pin 31, and after said slide is in position on the bar 22, a pin 32 is extended through an elongated slot 33 in said slide and screwed mm the top edge of thebar 22. A spring 34 is extended between the pins 31 and 32 to resiliently hold the slide in the position shown in Figures 2 and 3.

Mounted in each of the end slots 20 of the tabulator bar 18 is a reed 35. Each reed is provided with a spring clip 36 which, when the reed is shoved downwardly into the slot 22, detents beneath that portion of the closed end of the U-shaped bar 18 lying adjacent the slot, as best shown in Figure 4, to thereby prevent the accidental withdrawal of said reed. The upper end of the spring clip 36 is bent to form a tab 37, and said tab, by contacting the upper edge of the U-shaped bar 18, prevents the reed from being shoved entirely through said bar. By moving the tab 37 to the left, as viewed in Figure 4, as by pressing against the edge thereof with a screwdriver or the like, the spring clip will be released from detenting engagement with the bar 18 and the reed 35 may then be withdrawn. The upper end of each reed 35 is slotted to provide a pair of legs 38 and 39 of the same length as the stop legs 25 and 26 respectively. The longer leg 39 is provided with a recess near its upper end similar to the recess 27 of the stop 24.

When the auxiliary unit having the properly positioned stops is to be attached to the carriage, the bar 22 is held over the U-shaped tabulator bar 18 and lowered so that the legs 38 and 39 of the reeds 35 enter the end pairs of slots 23 of said bar 22. From Figure 1, it will be apparent that the bar 22 is at that time turned in such direction that the long legs 26 of the stops 24 are on the opposite side of the bar from the long legs 39 of the reeds 35, The locking slide 29 is provided along the edge opposite the legs 26 of the stops 24 with a plurality of notches or cutouts 40, and as the auxiliary unit is lowered into position, said slide is moved, as by pressing a finger piece 41, to the right, as viewed in Figure 2, to bring the notches 40 into alignment with the long legs 39 of the reeds 35 and thereby uncover the end slots 23 and permit the bar 22 to be lowered into close proximity with the top of the tabulator bar 18. When the bar 22 has been lowered to the point where the recesses in the legs 39 are above the top of said bar the locking slide is released and the spring 34 thereupon restores said slide to its normal position with the edge thereof sliding into the recesses of the long legs 39 to lock the auxiliary unit to the tabulator bar. The reeds 35 and the slide 28 thus constitute cooperating means on the tabulator bar and the auxiliary unit respectively to lock said unit to said tabulator bar.

It will be understood that as the bar 22 is lowered into position as above described the lower ends of the tabulator or column stops 24 enter the slots 20 of the tabulator bar 18 and, as shown in Figure 1 and indicated by chain-dotted lines in Figure 4, said stops extend beneath the lower edge of the tabulator bar when the auxiliary unit is in its final attached position and at that time, if the counterstop 21 is raised it Will intercept the tabulator stops and bring the carriage to rest at the columnar positions defined by said stops. Since the slots 23 in the bar 22 are spaced the same distance apart as the slots 20 of the tabulator bar 18 and since the bars 18 and 22 are of the same length, the tabulator stops must enter the proper and desired slots in the bar 18 when the reeds 35 enter the end slots 23 of the bar 22, thus assuring that the columnar setup of the machine will be the same as arranged on the auxiliary unit.

Particularly with a long carriage machine, it may be desired to provide a reed 35 intermediate the ends of the tabulator bar in order to strengthen the attachment of the auxiliary unit to the tabulator bar. The desired column stop setup may call for a tabulator stop occupying the slot 20 normally used for the intermediate reed and for that reason several cutouts 40, as shown in Figure 2, are provided, thereby permitting one of several slots 20 to be used for the intermediate reed.

It is not contemplated that the stop setup of the auxiliary unit will be changed, but rather that there will be a separate auxiliary unit for each type of work to be performed on the machine, thus making it an easy and quick matter to change the column setup of the machine as desired. Of course, if one style of column arrangement is to be permanently discontinued and another substituted therefor, the auxiliary unit may be disassembled and the column stops rearranged to suit the new column arrangement.

Having thus described the invention, what is claimed is:

In a typewriting or like machine having a letter-feed carriage tabulatable to a plurality of columnar positions, a tabulator bar secured to the carriage and extending lengthwise thereof, said bar having a series of slots therethrough, said slots being spaced apart letter-space distances of the machine, an auxiliary unit comprising a substantially rectangular bar having a series of slots in opposite sides thereof, elongated tabulator stops having portions positioned within certain of said slots of said rectangular bar, a slide mounted on one side of said rectangular bar and having an edge engaging portions of said tabulator stops to lock same to the bar, said tabulator stops extending through certain of the slots in the tabulator bar and projecting therebeyond for cooperation with a selectively projectable stop, and devices removably secured within certain of the slots in said tabulator bar and having portions fitted within certain of the slots in said rectangular bar, the slide on said rectangular bar being movable between two positions, said slide having means engageable with portions of said devices when said slide is in one of its positions to lock said rectangular bar to said devices and said tabulator bar, and said means being disengaged from said devices when the slide is in its other position to permit said rectangular bar to be easily removed.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 927,626 Woodward July 23, 1909 941,166 McLaughlin Nov. 23, 1909 974,438 Scjaaff Nov. 1, 1910 1,381,895 Stickney June 14, 1921 

